30 Years of East-West Migration in Germany: A Synthesis of the Literature and Potential Directions for Future Research

The reunification of the socialist German Democratic Republic and capitalist Federal Germany presents a unique setting for studying impact socio-economic political change on migration. This paper provides comprehensive review interdisciplinary literature migration between East West since reunification, conducted in disciplines such as economics, demography, sociology, human geography. We synthesise with regard to data-related challenges well individual contextual determinants clarify some misinterpretations discrepancies previous studies, identify research gaps, suggest directions future research. Our demonstrates that East-West mainly occurred line what could have been expected based theory migrants’ sex, age, education, labour market position, social networks. West-East migration, contrast, was strongly affected by return migrants who often stated non-occupational motives moving. On level, differences wages are better able explain over time than unemployment rates. however, cannot be explained macroeconomic models. contributes point reference this topic, internal disparities general.